Still at the six level.

I just wanted to start off by thanking the hundreds of people quietly stalking this blog. I’m sure you are there because I have such a terrific band of players involved in the commentary, so of course thanks to you all too. (Don’t feel like you can’t join in….) Hope everybody’s having fun.

Tomorrow a play hand – it’s been a while!

Yesterday was another ‘oh my God, if they’re at the six level and I have 2 aces they must be making’ sort of a hand. It’s funny, isn’t it? That we can feel so much more confident they are making if we can see actual cold hard tricks in our hand!

I was with Khokan and Ben on this one, it must be cold, it must be going down. I did go with double and that was +800 along with +600 for 3NT making in the other room. Desperately needed, as you will see tomorrow when we look at a play hand.

Cayne vs Victoria
Board 10
Dealer East
All Vul

NORTH

AJ251083AKQ543

WEST

76AQ87632A764—-

EAST

K109854—92J10876

SOUTH

Q3KJ1094KQJ592

Strange hand, isn’t it? It seems to me like everybody pretty much has their bid and yet what a result!

Of course, I suspect that if I’d given the hand as an East bidding problem, most people, especially at the vulnerability, would not have chosen 3S. It certainly gave South a difficult decision. In the other room East began with 2S and the following peculiar auction ensued:

If we used chess annotation surely the X of 3S would have been followed by a ?. IMO, it’s closer to ?? than to !?. Obviously S at the other table agreed: s/he not only failed to X 2S — a level lower — s/he didn’t even bid over partner’s 3C. If W hadn’t balanced with 3H — and who of us could have passed as W? — it would have been another of those “slam at one table, partscore at the other” deals.